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Advancements in Nostr Clients
Free speech on the internet depends on open, uncensorable communication infrastructure that keeps users in control. OpenSats launched The Nostr Fund in 2023 to support the nostr ecosystem building this infrastructure, and since then we have funded work on protocol development, developer tooling, relays, and a wide range of clients.
Nostr is a simple, open protocol for publishing and receiving signed messages, relayed by independent servers, not a single platform. The design is intentionally minimal: clients handle keys and signatures, and relays store and forward events. Anyone can run a client or a relay, and people are free to move between them without abandoning their identity or social graph. In his original 2019 white paper introducing nostr, fiatjaf described it as:
The simplest open protocol that is able to create a censorship-resistant global 'social' network once and for all.
—fiatjaf
Nostr shifts power toward users. A nostr identity is a keypair, not an account on a single site. If one client blocks or censors someone, removes features, or changes in ways they cannot accept, the user signs in to another client with the same keys. Their history, relationships, and audience move with them; they are not trapped inside any one application.
The same simple protocol that routes nostr posts can also route bitcoin between users via Lightning zaps. Many clients treat zaps as a native social action, and to date, statistics show users have sent millions of zaps, totaling more than 2.6 billion sats, directly to one another over nostr.
This impact report focuses on seven nostr clients with different approaches to product design and a shared commitment to openness, interoperability, and user sovereignty. Their progress shows how donor support translates into concrete improvements for people who rely on nostr for communication, coordination, and value transfer.
The seven clients highlighted in this report are:
Let's take a closer look at how each of these clients has evolved over the past year and how donor funding supported their work.
Amethyst
Amethyst is a long-running Android client for nostr, built with an emphasis on speed, resilience, and everyday use. Over the past year, work on the project focused on three areas: making relay use more automatic and robust, tightening private communication, and adding new ways for people to post and discover content inside the app. With support from OpenSats, Vitor Pamplona shipped a series of releases that changed how Amethyst talks to relays, how it handles private media, and how users explore what is happening on nostr.
The biggest shift came from moving Amethyst from a manual relay-list model to a dynamic outbox model. In older versions, users had to maintain their own lists of relays—the independent servers that store and forward nostr posts—and tell the app where to read from. If someone they followed moved to a different relay and the user did not update their list, posts simply stopped appearing, often without any clear indication that something was wrong. The outbox model flips that burden. Instead of asking users to guess which relays to read from, Amethyst now compiles the needed relay set automatically based on the user's actual follows and content. This was implemented in v1.03.0, along with an updated Relay List interface that lets users focus on where their own notes are published while the client assembles an effective read set in the background.
That change is not just a user-experience improvement; it also shifts how traffic flows across the network. Under the old approach, most activity ended up concentrated on 10--20 major relays, which made nostr more fragile than it appears on paper. With the outbox model, Amethyst can connect to as many as 1,000 relays at once, even over mobile data, and fetch posts directly from smaller or personal relays when needed. It does this without noticeably increasing data usage, which is important for people on limited connections or inexpensive phones. In practice, it shows that a mobile client can participate in a broad relay set rather than depending on a handful of large hubs. The outbox model is also wired into Amethyst's embedded Tor support, which is enabled by default, so these connections do not have to reveal a user's IP address to relay operators. Over time, that makes it more difficult to track users by IP or location across the relays they interact with.
Private messaging saw a similar step forward. With v0.94.0, Amethyst added encrypted media in direct messages (DMs) so users can share images and files in one-to-one conversations without leaving the nostr stack. The upload feature was reworked to handle multiple files and encrypted delivery, making it easier to send sensitive material in a way that is both convenient and private. This builds on earlier work that helped establish NIP-17 as the newer direct-messaging standard, closing metadata leaks that were present in the older NIP-04 design. Taken together, encrypted media and the newer DM format make private communication on nostr substantially harder to track or analyze from the outside.
Discovery features also evolved. Version 0.93.0 introduced a dedicated image feed powered by Olas, a photo-focused nostr service, an "Around Me" feed that highlights posts tied to the user's approximate location, and NIP-63 interactive stories. These additions allow users to browse photos in a focused stream, see what is happening nearby, or tap through story-style posts that feel closer to what mainstream social apps already offer. In the same release, Amethyst moved picture and video uploads to the newer NIP-68 and NIP-71 standards so that media handling matches the latest expectations across the ecosystem.
This achievement (outbox transition and relay changes) is a major demonstration of the true decentralized potential of nostr. By enabling mobile clients to automatically connect to 1,000 relays, we have fundamentally shifted the narrative. We've proven that users can be reliably served by a highly distributed network—not just a few central points.
—Vitor Pamplona
Over the past year, Amethyst has become a more decentralized, private, and expressive way to use nostr from an Android phone. The outbox model removed much of the manual relay management that used to frustrate users, encrypted media made private conversations safer, and richer content options made the app more engaging for everyday use. OpenSats support made it possible to pursue these longer-term improvements in a sustained way, strengthening both Amethyst itself and the broader nostr ecosystem.
Coracle
Coracle is a web-based nostr client designed to make decentralized social networking approachable without sacrificing flexibility or user choice. Over the past year, development has focused on stronger relay controls, smoother synchronization, and improvements that make the outbox model easier for everyday users to understand. With OpenSats' support, Hodlbod and Daniele delivered upgrades that make nostr communication more reliable and practical while pushing forward a clearer model of what relays are for.
A major milestone for Hodlbod's relay work was the merging of NIP-43 and its implementation in the zooid relay, enabling relays to publish and maintain their own membership lists: a relay can sign a list of members, accept join requests from users, and update that list over time. The NIP-86 implementation complements this by giving relay administrators a separate interface to add or remove members. Together, these features formalize a pattern in which relays are services with clear access controls and content curation policies. In other words, a relay can explicitly state who it is for and what kind of content it hosts.
Coracle's 0.6.x releases added a compose option that lets users choose which relays will receive a posted note. This gives authors direct control over distribution instead of relying on a handful of large relays, and it makes the outbox model tangible: users decide where their posts are published, and the client manages the rest. These releases also introduced proof-of-work display and generation, as well as editing tools for web-of-trust feeds, expanding the ways users can shape what they see and how their content propagates.
Additional development work by Daniele strengthened Coracle's day-to-day reliability. Version 0.6.26 introduced outbox-friendly relay controls, clearer publishing behavior, and smarter fallback mechanisms that keep the client connected even when individual relays fail. These adjustments reduce the number of instances where users encounter missing posts or slow-loading timelines and help Coracle maintain a consistent experience across a diverse relay set. The same release restored a global feed with performance improvements---an easy entry point for browsing the wider network without impacting advanced filtering tools.
Sync performance also received attention. Improvements to negentropy—the protocol's method for reconciling differences between client and relay state—made timelines feel faster and more predictable, especially when switching between relays or refreshing a busy feed. These changes reduce wait times and help users understand what is happening on the network.
Much of nostr's novelty has to do with keys and digital signatures. But focusing on the cryptographic aspects is, to me, actually something of a distraction. The important thing to realize is that digital signatures make relays possible—I mean this in the sense that digital signatures decouple data storage from data authentication. This means that the same information can be stored in multiple places—whether relays, local files, torrents, or anywhere else—and the names associated with these places lose their power and become far less meaningful. This puts the user in control, by allowing them to select and move between services and custodians, with support from the protocol for doing so.
—Hodlbod
Coracle has progressively improved how users read and publish notes from the browser. Per-note relay selection and outbox-aware relay controls let people choose where their notes are stored and retrieved instead of relying on a single default relay list. Negentropy-based sync, smarter fallback behavior when individual relays are slow, overloaded, or offline, and a restored global feed reduce missing posts and slow-loading timelines while making it easier to explore the wider network. With OpenSats' support, Hodlbod and Daniele focused on these deeper improvements to make the user experience more reliable overall while staying true to nostr's decentralized relay model.
Damus
Damus is a nostr client for iOS and Android that gives users a social feed with integrated support for Lightning zaps. Notedeck is a related multi-column client from the same team for desktop and Android, designed for heavier activity and parallel monitoring of multiple timelines.
Through several rounds of support from OpenSats beginning in July 2023, contributors worked across these Damus clients to improve localization, show where notes are stored and propagated, improve spam resistance, and integrate Nostr Wallet Connect and zaps directly into the core client workflow. Contributors Terry Yiu, Eric Holguin, KernelKind, and Will Casarin focused on localization, relay visibility, moderation tools, Lightning integration, and platform infrastructure spanning both clients.
Terry Yiu's work on localization ensured that Notedeck's Android launch shipped with a complete translation system. He also improved how Damus displays nostr's relay architecture. On iOS, each note posted can show how many relays carried it, which specific relays saw it, and relay hints embedded in links and tags. When a note does not appear in a user's feed, they can see whether it failed to reach their relays or whether the issue lies elsewhere. This shifts relay behavior from an invisible implementation detail to something users can inspect, which matters for a protocol that relies on many independent operators.
To address spam and low-quality replies without introducing centralized moderation, Terry implemented a web-of-trust reply sorter in Damus iOS. Replies from people in a user's social graph are prioritized, while others remain available but visually deprioritized. The filtering is client-side and opt-in, so anyone can still publish and read, but users gain more control over what appears in dense threads.
Eric Holguin focused on the bridge between nostr activity and Lightning payments. His redesign of the Damus wallet view adds a clear Nostr Wallet Connect integration, including visible balances, recent transactions, and a zap explainer. Users can see what funds are available, how they move, and what it means to send a zap. This reduces the friction of connecting a wallet and makes Lightning behavior legible.
Eric also integrated support for follow packs into Damus, along with a dedicated timeline in the Universe view. Follow packs, popularized by Calle's following.space project, are curated sets of accounts that users can subscribe to in a single action. When a new user's first nostr experience is an empty feed, discovery itself becomes a barrier to adoption. Follow packs address that problem using open data structures: they are visible, shareable, and easy to extend or unsubscribe from, ultimately improving discovery. Damus iOS also added interest-based follow suggestions to help new users discover relevant accounts during onboarding.
On desktop, KernelKind extended the same Lightning and usability focus into Notedeck's multi-column environment. Full Nostr Wallet Connect support is now integrated directly into columns: users connect their wallet using a Nostr Wallet Connect link, view balances, configure default zap amounts, and send zaps from timelines through both the wallet view and directly from each note in the timeline. This makes value transfer part of the normal reading and replying process.
KernelKind also reworked thread rendering in Notedeck. These changes make conversations easier to follow and reduce the friction of navigating long, branching discussions. Replies are now structured so that only direct responses appear under the selected note, reply chains are shown in order, unread markers highlight new activity, and navigation makes it easy to move between a specific branch and the broader context. This improves the readability of long discussions, including technical discussions and project coordination, and makes it more feasible to keep those conversations on nostr rather than relying on proprietary platforms.
In addition, KernelKind implemented a notifications view in Notedeck based on the Damus iOS design. It delivers real-time alerts for reactions and reposts with the same interaction patterns users know from Damus iOS, while running on a Rust-based architecture tuned for efficiency on low-end devices. Notedeck now groups these interactions, shows unseen indicators, and fixes navigation issues that previously led to dead ends when tapping a notification. This brings a familiar notifications experience to Notedeck and makes it clearer when people interact with posts.
We are working toward the Notedeck browser-platform vision: an open path for developers to build on Notedeck without reinventing the wheel. OpenSats accelerated this critical step toward a truly decentralized social ecosystem.
—KernelKind
A major architectural change this year was the continued development of NostrDB, the event database originally built for Damus iOS. NostrDB now underpins Damus Android and Notedeck and is being adopted by other nostr applications, including AirChat and software built on rust-nostr-sdk. This turns what began as an internal performance improvement into shared infrastructure available to the broader ecosystem.
At the platform level, Will Casarin advanced the Damus roadmap on Android and experimented with features that reduce dependency on public relays. The Damus Android launch delivered a native client with the familiar multi-column Notedeck interface and an integrated assistant to the mobile platform. In many regions, Android devices are the primary or only computing environment, so supporting them is important for growing a global user base.
Will's addition of local-network posting introduced a local sharing mode (multicasting) that lets Notedeck apps on the same Wi-Fi network share notes directly with each other without depending on public relays. This is useful at conferences, meetups, and in locations with poor or intermittent connectivity, and it demonstrates that nostr-style messaging can operate across different layers. Reducing reliance on remote infrastructure improves resilience and gives communities more options for how and where they host their communication.
Finally, Notedeck added algorithmic timelines, including a view that shows the last note per npub, supported by improvements to how timelines are stored and refreshed. These views allow users to create more focused feeds that reduce distractions without hiding the underlying data or delegating ranking decisions to a centralized service. Users can choose how to see information from their network, combining chronological feeds with higher-signal perspectives when needed.
Across mobile and desktop, Damus and Notedeck now give nostr users a consistent way to read, publish, and move value on the devices they already use. Localization expanded access, relay visibility and web-of-trust sorting gave users more insight and control, Nostr Wallet Connect and zaps integrated bitcoin directly into everyday use, and Android support plus local-network multicasting expanded where and how people can participate. The evolution of Notedeck as a reusable Rust codebase offers a foundation other nostr applications can build on. OpenSats' support allowed these contributors to spend sustained time improving the code that strengthens both the nostr ecosystem and the broader goal of user-controlled infrastructure.
Jumble
Jumble is a browser-based nostr client focused on helping users understand, choose, and interact with relays in a way that supports decentralization rather than defaulting to a few large relays. Its design centers on relay quality and user choice. Over the past year, with support from OpenSats, developer Cody Tseng has added features that improve relay discovery, key handling, and control over where notes are published.
One of the most visible changes was the introduction of relay reviews and featured relays in Jumble's Explore experience. Users can now rate the relays they use and browse relays that the app highlights based on reliability, responsiveness, or specialization. This replaces the guesswork that many newcomers face—trying to find a usable relay set from scattered community lists—and turns relay selection into something closer to a reputation system. By making well-run relays more discoverable and poor-performing ones easier to avoid, Jumble encourages users to rely less on a small set of large relays and instead distribute traffic across many smaller or specialized operators. These changes were implemented alongside improvements to relay ordering and overall discovery UX, offering a more intuitive way to explore the network.
Jumble also improved key safety and multi-app interoperability by adding client-initiated NIP-46 connections. Instead of pasting a private key into the browser, users can now pair Jumble with an external signer (such as Amber, Aegis, or nos2x) that holds the users' public and private key pairs. This reduces the risk of account takeover and makes it easier to use the same signer safely across multiple nostr apps. It replaces the old pattern of pasting private keys into the client directly and encourages a safer login workflow for people who use nostr on several devices or through several apps.
Finally, Jumble added outbox-aware publishing and event republishing controls. Users can now send or resend notes to specific relays, ensuring that posts reach the communities or topic-focused relays most relevant to them. This is especially helpful for specialized relays that host conversations around particular subjects, or for routing around outages or policy changes on individual relays. Giving users direct control over where their posts go helps break dependence on a small set of large relays and advances the broader shift toward the inbox/outbox model many nostr clients are adopting. It also gives users a clearer sense of how their posts move through the network and how relay choice affects visibility.
Jumble now gives users more insight and deliberate control in a protocol built on independent relay operators. Relay reviews and featured relays improve discovery, NIP-46 login flows make key handling safer without sacrificing interoperability, and targeted publishing aligns Jumble with nostr's emerging decentralization patterns. OpenSats' support allowed Cody Tseng to pursue these deeper improvements, helping Jumble move from a power-user tool toward a client that makes relay choice and safety understandable for everyone.
NoStrudel
NoStrudel is a web-based nostr client aimed at more technically inclined users who want a transparent view into how the protocol works while still having access to the features expected of a modern social application. It places a strong emphasis on local-first data, clear visibility into relay behavior, and support for emerging nostr standards. Over the past year, OpenSats' support has helped noStrudel developer hzrd149 improve private messaging, interoperability with other clients, and refine the underlying engine that powers the app.
In the recent noStrudel v0.45.0 release, the client added full support for NIP-17, a newer standard for private messages on nostr, and NIP-59 gift wrap, an extra layer that lets these messages travel across relays without exposing who the messages are for. NoStrudel also added a dedicated inbox view for this message format, so users see a straightforward chat interface even though the protocol working underneath is more complex. This brought noStrudel into alignment with other major clients such as Amethyst, 0xChat, Coracle, Flotilla, and Coop, allowing users to carry private conversations seamlessly across apps. In practice, it means encrypted, interoperable messaging that behaves consistently no matter which client their contacts use.
NoStrudel also received a major internal upgrade through the applesauce v4.x releases, which packages its core components into a shared library for building nostr web clients. Maintained by hzrd149, the applesauce SDK provides relay connections, timelines, signing, contacts, mutes, bookmarks, and NIP-17 direct-message support, along with newer protocol features such as more efficient syncing using NIP-77 and improved counting with NIP-45. Because applesauce is a shared library, other developers can reuse it instead of rebuilding these parts from scratch, helping new clients ship stable features faster. For noStrudel itself, using applesauce has already led to a cleaner split between the app and its engine, and recent work with the library has laid the groundwork for moving from a hard-coded relay list to an outbox model that builds timelines from the relays used by a user's contacts.
The biggest achievement has been building out the applesauce SDK to be the core of the app. This has allowed me to build and test features in isolation and then integrate them back into the app when I know they are working.
—Hzrd149
A complementary set of tools expanded noStrudel's focus on local-first data. The introduction of window.nostrdb.js, the Nostr Bucket browser extension, and Umbrel Blob Box—also developed by hzrd149—gives noStrudel access to locally stored events/posts and self-hosted media storage. These components allow the client to load timelines more quickly, reduce dependence on remote databases, and store images and files under the user's control. Users running noStrudel on StartOS, UmbrelOS, or in the browser gain the option to host their own media, keep data local, and build a more private and resilient setup without relying on third-party indexing services.
Over the past year, these efforts have made noStrudel a more capable and interoperable nostr client. Gift-wrapped DMs brought its private messaging in line with the broader ecosystem, applesauce v4 updated the internal engine that drives the app, and the local-first data tools offered faster timelines and more user-controlled storage. OpenSats' support enabled sustained work by hzrd149 across these areas, helping noStrudel continue its role as a transparent, standards-aligned client built for users who want deeper insight and control within the nostr network.
Nostur
Nostur is an iOS and macOS client designed to make nostr feel familiar to users coming from mainstream social apps while still preserving the protocol's core principles of openness and user control. Over the past year, development has focused on expanding media options, reducing onboarding friction, and reinforcing decentralized relay usage. With OpenSats' support, Fabian delivered a series of releases that brought Nostur closer to a full-featured, privacy-respecting social experience on Apple platforms.
Notes received an upgrade with the introduction of voice messages—short audio notes called Yaks. This addition closes a usability gap between nostr clients and mainstream messengers, allowing users to post quick recordings without switching apps. Because voice messages operate fully within the nostr ecosystem, they bring this convenience without relying on external communication channels.
Media handling improved as well with the implementation of picture-first posting, powered in part by Olas's photo-focused approach, along with native Blossom media uploads. Users can now publish posts where the image comes first, browse visually rich content, and store media on decentralized Blossom servers rather than centralized services. This shift strengthens durability and user ownership: creators can serve their media from multiple backend locations, mirror it automatically, and rely on open standards instead of third-party silos.
Nostur also made it easier for users to build meaningful feeds with the introduction of one-tap conversion of Lists into live feeds, letting users turn any curated set of accounts into a timeline without extra configuration. Follow Packs, added shortly after, help new users find active and relevant accounts immediately. Later releases expanded relay management by integrating outbox-style publishing and relay preview tools, reducing the need for manual list editing and aligning Nostur with the broader shift toward decentralized relay usage.
Throughout the year, Fabian emphasized resilience, simplicity, and decentralization. Nostur's web-of-trust filters helped mitigate several waves of spam attacks without central moderation, demonstrating that open networks can defend themselves without restricting who can publish. Nostur was also one of the first iOS and macOS clients to adopt Relay Autopilot (expands a user's relay set based on who they follow), extending outbox-style automation to Apple platforms and reducing reliance on a handful of large relays. Additional features like live streams and support for using a WordPress site as a personal media backend further expand what users can do while keeping data under their control.
One of the goals with Nostur is to provide a social media alternative that is free from manipulative algorithms, free from ad-based algorithms that prioritize engagement or promote doom scrolling. I think this has worked out pretty well. Nostur doesn't rely on any external algorithms, and you notice that things aren't pushed on you. I open Nostur to see what the people I follow have to say and not to become a target of an ad campaign.
—Fabian
Within the Apple ecosystem, Nostur is steadily becoming a more capable, privacy-oriented client that remains simple to use. Yaks give users an alternative way to post messages, decentralized media uploads give creators more control, and feed and outbox improvements make it easier for users to find and follow meaningful content. OpenSats' support made it possible for Nostur to expand its feature set while staying aligned with nostr's principle of user-driven networks.
Zap.stream
Zap.stream is a nostr-native live-streaming client with Lightning zap capabilities that lets creators broadcast directly over the protocol while keeping control of their identity and earnings. Over the past year, OpenSats has supported work by developer Kieran that helped the project expand from a desktop-focused tool into a full mobile experience, strengthen its streaming infrastructure, and introduce a production-ready media backend that other nostr applications can build on.
A major shift came from bringing live streaming to mobile devices. The Flutter apps for iOS and Android, developed by Kieran, now let creators go live directly from their phone camera, receive notifications, open streams through links, and connect their Lightning wallet through Nostr Wallet Connect. Streaming on nostr is now accessible to everyday users rather than limited to desktop setups or custom RTMP software. These changes began with the v1.1.0 release in May 2025 and continued through subsequent updates that improved zap handling and polished the viewing and broadcasting experience. The result is a mobile app that makes it easy to start streaming and earning sats without giving up keys or relying on custodial platforms.
Zap.stream's backend became more flexible through the development of their core streaming server, a Rust-based engine maintained by Kieran that handles live video. It ingests RTMP live video streams, converts them into standard or low-latency HLS formats used by video players, records broadcasts, and exposes real-time metrics for operators. Because the engine is self-hostable and supports horizontal scaling, anyone can run their own streaming backend that works with the zap.stream interface. This moves nostr live streaming away from a single service and toward a distributed marketplace of independent providers, closer to the network's broader goal of minimizing single points of failure.
The project also introduced Route96, a nostr-integrated media backend designed for large video files, clips, and replayable content. Deployed at nostr.download, Route96 supports both NIP-96 and Blossom, optimizing media with thumbnails and compression, mirroring uploads across servers, honoring Lightning-based storage limits, and serving files efficiently to video clients. For applications like zap.stream, this provides durable, decentralized storage without relying on legacy cloud infrastructure. For the wider ecosystem, it offers a ready-to-use media backbone that any nostr client can integrate with, enabling richer features such as VOD, clips, and image hosting without each project needing to build its own storage stack.
As a result of this work, zap.stream has become a nostr live-streaming client that pairs an easy mobile experience with self-hostable, interchangeable backend infrastructure. The mobile apps made streaming accessible to more creators, the Rust engine made backend infrastructure deployable by anyone, and Route96 provided a reliable way to store and deliver large media files. OpenSats' support allowed Kieran to continue development across these areas, helping zap.stream demonstrate what a user-controlled, open-protocol approach to live streaming can look like.
The progress highlighted in this report shows nostr clients moving from early experiments into dependable tools for a growing user base. Outbox models are improving nostr's decentralization by having clients read from the relays people actually publish to instead of defaulting to a handful of large relays. Better key handling and external signers are reducing the risk of account loss. Local-first data stacks, media backends, and notification systems are giving users more control over how and where their data lives. Together, these projects are turning the promise of portable identity and censorship-resistant communication into tangible applications that people use every day.
OpenSats supports this work so that the foundations of nostr remain free, open, and user-controlled. Grants give developers time to solve problems like sync reliability, spam resistance, and onboarding flows, and to release features like zaps, live streaming, and interoperable DMs in public code that anyone can inspect, reuse, and build upon. The developers behind these clients are not just building individual apps; they are defining how the nostr protocol feels in practice and proving that users do not have to trade sovereignty for convenience.
Nostr is still young, and there is plenty left to do—from better discovery and safety tools to more resilient relay infrastructure and richer application types. With thoughtful funding and continued collaboration, client developers can keep pushing nostr toward a future where people everywhere can speak, coordinate, and move value without asking for permission.
If you believe in building and maintaining censorship-resistant communication infrastructure, consider supporting The Nostr Fund. Every donation directly helps independent developers ship open-source software that keeps users in control.
If you are a developer working on a nostr project that strengthens this ecosystem, we encourage you to apply for funding.